Is it possible that the the two most prominent Cabinet officials in the Executive Branch decided to blow off Fox News today.

Is the White House playing favorites again with media outlets?

There has been a back-and-forth between Fox News and the White House ever since President Barack Obama took his oath in 2009. And the latest episode appears to have occurred on Sunday after Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and Secretary of Defense Robert Gates made the rounds on the Sunday morning talk show circuit to discuss Libya, appearing on ABC’s “This Week,” NBC’s “Meet the Press,” and CBS’s “Face the Nation,” but not “Fox News Sunday.”

That drew a response from Fox News Sunday host Chris Wallace, following his interview with potential 2012 GOP presidential hopeful Newt Gingrich.

“Of course we wanted to get the White House view on Libya,” Wallace said. “However, they chose to offer Secretary of State Clinton and Defense Secretary Gates to ABC, CBS and NBC, but not to Fox. Despite the fact that we routinely have more viewers than two of those Sunday shows, the Obama team felt no need to explain to the millions of you who watch this program and Fox News why they have sent U.S. servicemen and women into combat. We thought you’d like to know.”

First, some questions:

- How common is it for the SECDEF and SECSTATE to NOT go on all of the major Sunday talk shows? It seems to me that, if you go on one, you go on all of them.
- I didn’t see the Sunday shows today—full disclosure; I never watch them—but I don’t see CNN’s Late Edition in the Daily Caller’s list above. Did Gates and Clinton go on CNN? If they didn’t go on CNN, what’s the chance they did it to establish plausible deniability. (Stop whining, Fox—we didn’t go on CNN either. We disrespected ALL the cable channels)
- How big a deal is this, really?
- How can FOX retaliate? Does FOX have the ability to exact any meaningful revenge on the Obama White House over this? I’m thinking that O’Reilley can have a field day with this.
- Is Chris Wallace now an apostate in the eyes of the MSM?

Now, some thoughts:
- Assuming the worst, that this was a deliberate snub, then it’s a troubling sign that the Obama administration is Shooting The Big Nuke, when it comes to civility. If they’re throwing insults like this NOW, almost two years before the election—imagine what it will be like by Labor Day 2012.
- Also assuming the worst—Robert Gates was party to this. I have to admit—that’s the one thing that’s making me think this wasn’t a deliberate snub. I can see Hillary going along with a snub…but Robert Gates?